


i've only felt religion when i've lied with you

by haecates



Category: Batman (Comics), Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics), Red Hood/Arsenal (Comics)
Genre: Fluff and Angst, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-29
Updated: 2015-10-29
Packaged: 2018-04-28 19:27:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5102927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haecates/pseuds/haecates
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jason has always had trouble sleeping. And then Roy happened.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i've only felt religion when i've lied with you

**Author's Note:**

> For those friends on twitter who talk about JayRoy all the time and got me inspired. I might have used some of your tweets as a prompt. Hope you guys enjoy it! :)

He had always had trouble sleeping.

When he was a kid, before it all went wrong - not that his life was ever right to start with — he used to lay in bed worried. He would wake up several times at night just to check if his mother was still breathing. Sometimes he laid on her side, she was too high to even acknowledge his presence, and would try to sleep there. Sometimes she hugged him and sometimes she didn't move at all. On the worst nights, she cried for his father to come back and Jason hid under his bed, afraid he would actually come.

After she died, or so he thought, he was unable to sleep for more than two hours. Afraid of the bigger and tougher boys, or too hungry, or haunted by the images of his mother's dead body and his own screams. His own terror. The knowledge that his life has always been bad, but it was about to get worse. And it did.

Until it got better.

The first night at the Wayne Manor, he was unable to sleep. He laid on bed, wearing pajamas that didn't belong to him, covered by silk sheets that were too soft against his calloused skin and felt wrong. Every time he closed his eyes he was reminded that he did not belong there — it was a joke. Bruce Wayne was probably a sadist or worse, Dr. Hopkins had probably told him to give Jason a lesson. To teach him not to steal by showing him what he would never have.

But then he got to stay there and, even though the manor started feeling like home, his nights were filled with anything better than sleeping. Being Robin was everything he ever needed — he actually felt lighter, as if the weight on his shoulders would fall back on his enemies after one or two punches. And no matter what Batman told him, he was good. He felt good. When he slept, too late for a kid his age to be awake, he would kick and punch on his sheets, having dreams or nightmares. He was never sure of the difference.

And then it got worse again — he never dared to say it out loud, but the night he slept the most was the night he died. When he woke up, punching wood until his knuckles bled, he was sure that it was overrated. He'd rather never sleep again than feel that way — claustrophobic, his lungs not working properly as if the air he was buried with was not enough for him.

During his time with Talia, he slept worse, he didn't trust her at first and when he did, he was too used to live by taking naps, the dark circles under his eyes so familiar that they were already part of himself. He felt as if it had come with Lazarus' pit, the white streak on his hair and the dark circle under his eyes - he would just have to deal with them.

::::

It was usually past midnight when Roy entered his room, crawling up on his bed as if it was forbidden, as if Jason wouldn't notice him, getting closer and closer as the night got darker, his warm breath on his neck until the sun got up in the sky and then, as if he was afraid, Roy would crawl out of bed and make them breakfast. As if it never happened, even though it happened every night.

The first time, Jason was uncomfortable, he was awake the whole night thinking of all the ways he could escape Roy's arms. He tried to move a little, maybe get out of bed without waking Roy up and then sleep on the couch, he trusted the redhead to be smart enough and not ask him anything in the morning. He trusted him to not break them apart — as much as Jason wasn't much of the sleeping together type of guy, he was still the fucking against the kitchen counter kind of guy.

When he finally decided what to do, Roy was crawling out of his bed without saying a word and when Jason was up and met him at the kitchen, Roy just smiled at him "I hope you like waffles, Jaybird" and they never mentioned it again. So it happened again, and again, and again.

He got used to it — and on the best nights, he slept for more than a nap and only woke up when Roy was leaving, his side of bed getting colder and colder until Jason finally gave in and got out of bed, to meet Roy at the kitchen, his always crooked smile and the way he looked when had just woken up and his hair was all messy.

So on that night, when the clock told him was midnight, he was expecting it. He was expecting him to open the door silently, he was expecting for his guilty pleasure, for their unspoken secret. But the clock told him it was one a.m. and then one thirty and the door never opened. Jason closed his eyes, trying to take one of his naps, but his brain wouldn't stop — he thought about his mother and Batman and the Joker, he thought about dying and being alive and he thought about how Harper was the only one to make his brain quiet.

He thought until it was three a.m. and he had a headache. He crawled out of bed, telling himself it was just a pill, but wasn't surprised when he was on Roy's bedroom door, opening it silently, as if keeping a secret. When he opened the door he saw Roy and a bottle of vodka and his heart raced so fast he was afraid he would die again, but he kept on walking in, Roy staring at the bottle as if it was everything he ever wanted.

"Roy? You okay, pal?" His voice sounded weird and he knew he shouldn't have said that. He wouldn't have said that in a million years if he was thinking. He walked up to his bed and sat on his side, Roy's eyes all watered. "Where did you get this?"

"Mail," he answered briefly, in a raspy tone Jason was only used to hearing when he talked about the things that hurt him the most, and that was usually when they were both up after two a.m. and it was too late for one to judge the other. Jason took the bottle, his sight still on Roy, half afraid of his reaction. Half afraid of fighting his... Whatever they were. Roy closed his eyes and then Jason was fast, he had been trained by Batman after all, and threw it out of the window so fast that he only listened to Roy's cry way too late.

They stared at each other for what seemed to be like forever, not saying a word — as normal as it was for Jason, to have Roy that quiet unsettled him. It felt like things were out of balance.

"Are you okay, Roy?" he asked and the one answer he got was Roy's back against him, his soft cry the one sound against the silence.  
He stood there for what it felt like forever, his whole body begging to rest because the guy in front of him had gotten him used to nights of sleep. He could feel his eyes getting heavy and something wrong with his lungs, as if all the air in the world wasn't enough for him right now.

He remembered one night, he and Tim in Dick's apartment in Chicago, all of them half drunk when Tim pointed out a Barbara picture on the wall and Dick smiled - that smile he gave when he was too sad to show it - and said "Sometimes I miss her so much I can't breathe". Jason thought it was the biggest bullshit he had ever heard and mocked him for hours, but right now, Roy crying on his pillow and the smell of alcohol on his fingers, he missed being with him so much he couldn't properly breathe.

He crawled on his bed, half-afraid and half-hopeful, but didn't wait like Roy did to get closer. He needed to get closer and so he did, too clumsy and too desperate, his arms maybe holding onto Roy too tight. "I'm sorry," he said and Roy turned slowly to look at him "I thought you didn't notice me," his voice was half whisper and half cry, and Jason tried to wipe his tears even though he didn't know how to do it softly.

"I always did," it was a confession and, as if it happened when he punched on bad guys, he felt the weight slowly out of his shoulder, melting on their bed as Roy moved to look at him. Jason smiled a half-smile, and closed his eyes "And I'm making breakfast this morning"


End file.
